Nicolle Flint (Boothby, Liberal Party) Share this | Hansard source

We on this side of the House took a very positive plan to the 18 May election, and I'm really proud of that plan. It was a positive plan, and we ran a very positive campaign. I wish we could say the same for those opposite, and I will certainly be saying a lot about that in the future.

I'm really pleased to speak on this matter today, because when it comes to advancing a positive agenda for the Australian people, for our nation and for the national interest it is the Morrison government that comes to mind. But don't take my word for it. If we cast our minds back just a few months, it was the Australian people who backed our positive plan for the nation. Our government took our plan to the Australian people, and the Australian people gave us responsibility for implementing our agenda. And that's exactly what we're doing.

I can't think of a more positive agenda for Australia than delivering tax relief for hardworking Australians, leaving more of the money that they have worked hard to earn in their pockets. They're the best people to spend their money. It's our government that delivered immediate tax relief for low- and middle-income earners as soon as we got back to parliament, and I'm incredibly proud that we did that. More than 10 million workers will receive a tax offset when they do their tax return this year, with around 4.5 million people who are hardworking Australians receiving the full amount of just over $1,000.

We're also delivering short-, medium- and long-term reform to our tax system, which means that by the time our tax relief plan is fully implemented 94 per cent of taxpayers will pay no more than 30 cents in the dollar. To me, that sounds exactly like advancing a positive agenda for the nation and a positive agenda for hardworking Australians. But our tax plan won't just reward hardworking Australians; it will also strengthen our economy. And we know why a strong economy matters. A strong economy means we can afford to guarantee the essential services that all Australians rely on, whether that's education, health care, delivering important infrastructure upgrades or looking after our environment. On health, for example, it means record funding for Medicare, a fully funded NDIS with no increase to the Medicare levy to deliver that, and funding for more than 2,000 new life-changing and live-saving medicines worth more than $10 billion on the PBS. That is what we have delivered and are delivering for the Australian people.

The local residents in my electorate of Boothby are directly seeing the benefits of our health funding firsthand at the old Repatriation General Hospital site in Daw Park, which is in the heart of my electorate and is very much the heart of my electorate. This is a very significant hospital precinct for my community. It's a place where, for generations, veterans who have made the ultimate sacrifice or put their hand up to make the ultimate sacrifice for our country have gone for treatment. It's a place that's very dear to their heart, and it's a place that was closed down by the former state Labor government.

Unfortunately, everyone on that side of this place, particularly those South Australian federal members, stood by and watched the former Weatherill Labor government shut down the repat, much to the great distress of my community, particularly the veterans community. I'm incredibly proud that the Morrison and Marshall Liberal governments are reactivating the repat hospital. This is an incredibly positive thing to do for my community, and I can't wait to see the building soon commence. The federal government is providing more than $40 million of funding towards reactivating the precinct, which will support a state-of-the-art brain and spinal injury unit at the site.

We're putting our specialist dementia care unit for South Australia there, to care for some of our most vulnerable citizens. It is absolutely critical that they are in a place that is safe, where they will be provided with a wonderful level of care and they will never again be out of sight or out of mind. We are also establishing a residential eating-disorder unit there, which we know is desperately needed. Also, we will be placing a brand-new veterans wellbeing centre there, which I'm working on very closely with my veterans community. These are just some of the very positive things the Morrison government is delivering for hardworking Australians.

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